


When Love Says Stay

by tookumade



Series: Heart Reign [5]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Emotional Constipation, M/M, Minor Original Character(s), Pining, Second Chances
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-26
Updated: 2020-09-26
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:00:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,140
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26664823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tookumade/pseuds/tookumade
Summary: “Oi, Miya! Get over here, I want you to meet someone!”Suna almost spits his drink across the table.“I’ve been here for more than half an hour, Kameda. You said you’d be—”“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I got held up! But, here—I wanted you to meet someone. This is my co-worker, Suna Rintarou. Suna, this is—”He could’ve been any Miya at all in the entirety of Japan. At all.In the entire country.He could’ve even beenMiya Atsumu.But no, the universe has it out for Suna, and he is looking up at his ex-boyfriend—“—Miya Osamu.”
Relationships: Miya Osamu/Suna Rintarou
Series: Heart Reign [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1514411
Comments: 113
Kudos: 667





	When Love Says Stay

**Author's Note:**

> “so in canon, it turned out to be the complete reverse where Osamu drops volleyball and Suna is the one who goes pro, what are you gonna do?”
> 
> I set the _Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence_ tag face down and end my turn
> 
> (This fic contains several references to the other works in this [_Heart Reign_](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1514411) series, and will probably be confusing if you haven't read the others yet.
> 
> If you've been reading since the start — all my love and thanks. ♡)

The weather looks absolutely terrible. It’s the middle of summer, but it’s currently bucketing rain outside the clinic Suna works for, meaning the humidity later on is going to be _brutal_. Suna tries not to groan out loud, tries to focus on his physiotherapy patient instead—a young woman in her early twenties who had injured her knee playing soccer, and is currently making her way unsteadily down a set of parallel bars.

“You’re doing really well,” says Suna, less encouraging and more matter-of-fact after she collapses into a chair at the end. “It used to take you a lot longer to use these.”

“It’s been _ages_ ,” the young woman mumbles sulkily as she takes the water bottle Suna hands her. 

“Asada-san, be patient,” Suna chides gently as he picks up his clipboard and makes some notes. “You’ve made a lot of progress since you first came here.”

Asada shrugs. “You’re a good doctor.” She tends to be more blunt when she’s tired, and she and Suna aren’t that far apart in age, which is maybe why she gets along best with him, out of all the physiotherapists at this clinic.

“I appreciate that, but I’m not a doctor,” Suna reminds her. “No doctorate, remember?”

“Eh, it’s all the same to me.”

Suna snickers. “Finish your drink. Take a breather, and then we’ll give the bars one more go, okay?”

“Ugh,” says Asada. It’s her way of agreeing; Suna’s used to it by now.

“That’s the spirit,” he says, flipping through some pages.

“Am I your last patient for today?”

“Yep.”

“Do you have any plans for tonight? Or the weekend?”

“No plans. And I work on Saturdays.”

“You know, I’ve been your patient for months, and I don’t think you’ve dated anyone in that time.”

Suna throws her an alarmed look. “ _Hey, now_ , why this sudden interest in my love life?”

“It’s not that sudden. I’ve been wondering why you don’t have a significant other for a while. You’d think people would be scrambling to date a doctor.”

“Not a doctor.”

“Not the point. I can introduce you to some of my single friends, if you’d like?”

“My god, are you my relative?” Suna tries not to look too horrified. “Do _not_ introduce me to anyone, or I’m gonna pass you off to Kameda.”

Asada pouts at him. “Even Kameda-sensei is seeing someone.”

Suna pinches the bridge of his nose. “ _Why_ has Kameda been telling you about his personal life?”

“He hasn’t! He’s been very professional. But he’s got this _glow_ about him, and it’s _so obvious_ he’s in love.”

“There, you’ve hit the magical P-word: ‘professional’. And as a professional, I’m saying that your break’s over, so give the bars one more go. On your feet—come on!”

Asada gives an exaggerated sigh, but sets her water bottle down and stands up unsteadily. “It’s just nice, being in love,” she says. “You’re a good physiotherapist, and I just think you deserve to be with someone who makes you happy, that’s all.”

“That’s very nice of you to say, but you’re sounding increasingly like my aunt.”

At this, Asada snickers as she grips the bars once more. “Just let me know if you want me to set you up.”

“God, I hope your knee heals soon.”

“Same. But for now, you’re stuck with me.”

“Terrible,” says Suna, but he smiles, and Asada’s grin widens. “Horrible. Awful.”

Asada begins to hobble along the parallel bars.

* * *

After Asada has left the clinic, Suna settles back at his desk and collects his notes and paperwork together, when his co-worker approaches him.

“Hey, Suna?”

“Yeah?” Suna looks up, and then immediately squints. “Okay, I recognise that look. What do you want now, Kameda?”

“ _Hey_ ,” says Kameda indignantly. “Why do always assume that I want someth—okay, fine, _fine_ , stop looking at me like that. Are you free tonight?”

“This sounds bad.”

“It’s _not_ , but—”

“But.”

“But… remember that girl I’ve been talking about?”

Suna groans. “I find it hard to _forget_ , given that you talk about her _every day._ Have you asked her out yet? It’s been _weeks_ , man.”

“That’s the thing! She asked me to go with her and some friends to get drinks at a bar—”

Suna turns back to his paperwork. “Nope.”

“ _Suna_ ,” Kameda whines. “I need you to be my wingman!”

“I’m not signing up for this.”

“I’ll buy you food.”

“Try again.”

“I’ll buy you a… a drink. _Two_ drinks.”

“Why can’t you ask Noguchi-san?”

“Because his wife is _terrifying_.”

“She’s, like, half your size, Kameda.”

“ _Sunaaa_.” Kameda gestures helplessly with his hands. “Look… you’re single, right? I know a guy—a friend of a friend who I’ve also invited—”

“What is this conspiracy?” Suna mumbles. “First Asada-san, now you… did you blackmail this guy?”

“ _No_.” Kameda stares at him pointedly now. “He’s just more agreeable than you are. But, actually, he… he doesn’t know that I’m meeting that girl. I told him it’s just for drinks between me and him.”

Suna whirls around in his seat and stares at him in disbelief. “ _Kameda!_ ”

“ _The point is_ , you’re both single, he’s actually a professional volleyball player, and you, uhh, played volleyball back in high school, and…” Kameda trails off, blinking, casting around for ideas, and obviously finding none. Suna buries his face in his hands.

“Oh, god… You know what? I have to go with you,” he says. “I don’t care about the guy, but I have to make sure you don’t mess things up with this girl, because at this rate, you’re going to screw it up _royally_ , and I will never hear the end of it. I won’t be able to handle it.”

“You’re the _best!_ ”

“ _On the condition_ that you buy me two drinks tonight, and you have to do my paperwork for two weeks.”

“One,” Kameda immediately counters. “One week. No, your handwriting _sucks_ , Suna. You can’t do this to me.”

Suna glares at him, but can’t refute; his handwriting _is_ pretty terrible. “Fine. Seven working days, meaning Sunday isn’t included. In fact, make it eight days, and consider it a... fee.”

Kameda makes a whining noise. “Seven days, two drinks.”

“ _Are you seriously bargaining right now?_ ”

“ _Your handwriting_ ,” Kameda whispers loudly. He points to Suna’s current piece of paperwork, which looks like—

“Fine,” says Suna waspishly, covering it up with a notebook. “ _Fine_. Seven days, _three_ drinks.”

“Have I ever told you that you’re my favourite co-worker?”

“Have I ever told you that I plan on shipping you off to a remote island somewhere?”

Kameda beams at him. “Wait for me at reception in half an hour, okay?”

“You’re starting my paperwork on Monday.”

“ _Thanks Sunaaa!_ ”

And Kameda practically skips away. Suna rubs his eyes with a groan and seriously contemplates asking his boss for a pay raise.

* * *

Ever since Suna moved to Kobe a few years ago so he can be closer to his workplace, he likes to think that he’s settled into the big city pretty well. It’s a bustling place but he thinks it still has a relaxed feel about it. And he likes Kobe’s nightlife in general: good restaurants, good bars, good atmosphere. He likes going out.

Usually, anyway. 

But not tonight, after begrudgingly meeting Kameda after work and making their way over to the bar he had mentioned. No—tonight, Suna wants nothing more than to be tucked into his comfy bed. This bar they’re in _sucks_. Or maybe Suna’s just tired and hungry, and therefore a bit cranky. It’s been less than half an hour and he is ready to go home. Kameda had disappeared somewhere a few minutes ago after buying Suna the first drink he had demanded. How was he supposed to be a wingman like this? Did this mean that he could just up and leave?

He seriously considers it, but then he sees Kameda bounding over towards his table, grinning from ear to ear and ignoring (or not noticing—it was hard to tell with this airhead) Suna’s glare over his glass of highball.

“It turns out that she really likes me, too!” says Kameda. “We’re going to grab dinner and talk properly, so I’m heading off first.”

“ _What?!_ ” Suna squawks, slamming his glass down. “What did I come here for, then?!”

“You gave me courage!”

“I’m gonna kick your _ass!_ ”

“I _really_ appreciate you coming, I just didn’t know it’d go so quickly! So just… chill here for a bit, okay? Enjoy the, uh, atmosphere? Enjoy your drink. I’ll see you at work tomorrow. Oh!” He waves to someone behind Suna. Suna rolls his eyes and raises his glass to his lips again. Might as well finish this so he can— 

“Oi, Miya! Get over here, I want you to meet someone!”

Suna almost spits his drink across the table.

“I’ve been here for more than half an hour, Kameda. You said you’d be—”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I got held up! But, here—I wanted you to meet someone. This is my co-worker, Suna Rintarou. Suna, this is—”

He could’ve been any Miya at all in the entirety of Japan. At all. _In the entire country_. He could’ve even been _Miya Atsumu_. But no, the universe has it out for Suna, and he is looking up at his ex-boyfriend—

“—Miya Osamu.”

“Aah,” says Suna weakly. He could have sworn that Osamu had made the same noise at the same time.

Kameda hasn’t noticed (because why the hell would he, Suna thinks). “Suna’s one of the other physiotherapists at my clinic! He’s helped me out a lot. I mean, not with actual physiotherapy stuff, but like… work stuff. I mean, sort of physio stuff, but, like, paperwork and… _anyway_ , Suna, Miya plays volleyball for the Panasonic Panthers, and—oh, _hey!_ Didn’t you say _you_ used to play _volleyball_ in _high school?_ ”

Osamu looks like he’s fighting back a laugh as Suna presses his hand over his eyes.

“Kameda?” says Suna. “Stop talking.”

“Okay!” says Kameda, delighted. “Well, I’m just gonna… um… let you chat!”

“Oi, what about my drinks—?”

But Kameda has practically danced away, joining a pretty woman by the bar counter who beams at him and nudges him playfully with her elbow. Suna isn’t sure whether he should feel sorry for her or not, because she might just be as clueless as Kameda is if she likes him back.

Osamu really is laughing now as he slides into the other stool at Suna’s table. It’s a nice sound. Suna hasn’t heard it in a while.

“That jackass,” Suna says, pulling himself together so he can nod over at Kameda, “promised me three drinks tonight. I don’t think he’s going to make good on the other two.”

“Rude,” says Osamu mildly, as though he ran into ex-boyfriends every day and had gotten used to it. “We can tackle him down, if you like.”

“I don’t actually think it’s worth the effort.”

“Use it against him for next time. How was your drink? What did you have?”

Suna shakes his head and makes a face. “A highball. It was shit.” 

“Damn, I was going to get one. I’ve only had a beer and it wasn’t cold enough… Wanna leave? It’s really stuffy in here.”

“First good idea I’ve heard all day.” Suna grabs his jacket.

Maybe not such a good idea, he thinks the moment they step out of the bar and the breath of fresh air he takes clears his mind a little. Where would they even go now? They hadn’t seen each other in a while, and they are _ex-boyfriends._ What is the protocol from here? What would they—

“Have you eaten?” Osamu asks, and Suna actually feels himself relax. Food, of course—this is Miya Osamu he is in the company of, after all.

“Not yet,” he says. “I’m going to assume that you’re hungry?”

Osamu grins, and Suna fights back a laugh. “Always,” says Osamu. “I don’t know of many good places to eat around here, though.”

“Well, lucky for you, I am well-assimilated into the lovely city of Kobe. There’s a good curry place just a few minutes walk away. There might be a queue, but they have decent portions.”

“Let’s go.”

They set off, Osamu following Suna’s lead. 

It feels like there’s a world of things they could talk about, given that it’d been a while since they had last spoken, but in that same vein, it felt like too much. How had Osamu been, what’s he been up to aside from volleyball, is he working elsewhere, is he enjoying playing for the Panasonic Panthers, how were the years leading up to him signing with them, how is his family, how is Atsumu, was Atsumu excited for his recent transfer to the JTEKT Stings, are they getting along better—

“So, how do you know Kameda?” Suna settles on, which is a weak topic, but he felt it was a better starting point than ‘how are you’.

(Why is he _thinking_ about this so much?)

“Oh, he’s a friend of one of my teammates,” Osamu answers. “We’ve had dinner together a few times. He said you work with him, right?”

“Yeah.”

“My sympathies. I’m kidding,” Osamu adds when Suna gives a snort of laughter. “He can be an airhead, but he’s not a bad guy.”

“Mm, I guess… I’m surprised he’s survived this long, honestly.”

“He’s the type who can talk himself out of trouble.”

“You’re giving him too much credit.”

“He convinced you to come out with him today, didn’t he?”

Suna gives him a betrayed stare. “I had _no choice_ , I only went to make sure he didn’t mess it up with that girl he won’t shut up about!”

“Oh? _Suna Rintarou_ ,” says Osamu, a sly grin spreading across his face. “You went as someone’s _wingman?_ ”

When Suna jams the heels of his palms against his eyes with a groan, Osamu starts to laugh. “Kameda promised me three drinks and a week of doing my paperwork, but I’m starting to think it’s not worth it.”

“ _You went as his wingman_ ,” Osamu gasps.

“Come on, stop laughing! The alternative was that he messed it up with that girl, and then I’d have to hear about _that_ non-stop. Tell me you wouldn’t have done the same thing in my shoes.”

“His _wingman_ , though.”

“You know, I could just leave you here and go home. You’ll never know the delights of that curry place.”

“Okay, okay,” says Osamu, still grinning widely. Suna rolls his eyes.

It’s busy at the restaurant, but here’s no queue tonight, and Suna is glad. They can jump straight to the menus and the food, no need to try making conversation as they stand around waiting.

(No, seriously, _why is he thinking about this so much???_ )

“It smells so good here,” says Osamu excitedly as the waitstaff member leads them to a booth. “What do you recommend?”

Suna shrugs, thumbing through the menu. “I mean… it’s curry, so… Wait”—Osamu makes a scandalised sort of noise—“I forgot who I was talking to. My bad. I recommend their medium-spicy curry with crumbed pork. Their gyoza is really good, too.”

“That’s more like it.”

Suna decides on a medium-sized curry udon with fried chicken, and Osamu ponders a large-sized curry rice with crumbed pork and egg, and a green salad and gyoza on the side.

“Should I add cheese with my curry?” he says, tapping his cheek thoughtfully as he studies the menu.

“On top of all that? I’m not even going to think about it, it’s making me queasy.”

“You’ve always had a tiny appetite, though.”

“I eat a normal amount. _You’re_ the one with the bottomless pit for a stomach.”

“I’m adding cheese.”

“You do that, Kirby.”

Osamu flags a member of the waitstaff down, and they place their orders. He looks excited, like a kid being told by their parents that they’re headed to a theme park for the weekend. Suna tries and fails to stifle a huff of laughter, and Osamu squints mock-suspiciously at him.

“I just,” says Suna, shaking his head and grinning, “kind of forgot the extent of how much you love food. It’s nice to know that hasn’t changed.”

“It hasn’t been _that_ long, has it?”

“I haven’t seen you since second year of uni, I think? That time we went for dinner with Atsumu, Gin, and Kosaku, when we went to get… what was it… oh, burgers and steaks.”

“Oh… yeah, I guess you’re right.” Now, Osamu smiles and drops his gaze to the table, drumming his fingers on the surface, and adds in a quieter voice, “It feels like I have a lot I want to tell you, but I can’t decide on what.”

Suna exhales, shoulders relaxing a little. “I know the feeling.”

“You dropped volleyball, didn’t you?” says Osamu slowly. “When my uni’s team played your uni in third year, I didn’t see your name on the roster.”

It’s Suna’s turn to drop his gaze, feeling an odd spasm in his stomach. 

“Yeah,” he says, trying to keep his voice casual. “I got… bored. I think I was so used to playing volleyball with you and Atsumu and the others at Inarizaki, that when I played with my university team, it was so… _boring_. They got a new coach at the start of my first year, and he changed everything. The tactics, the play-style, the attacks… shit, I nearly fell asleep during training.”

“You left?” Osamu asks.

“I stayed until half-way through second year. I guess I hoped things would pick up. And, I mean, I like volleyball, so…” Suna shrugs. “Well, I got busy enough that I think I would’ve dropped it eventually anyway.”

Osamu smiles slightly. “You know you were good enough to go straight to the pro leagues.”

“Hah! In an alternate universe, maybe.”

“Why not? A different life where you’re the one playing volleyball professionally, and I’ve opened up my own food business instead.”

“It’s true… if you weren’t so keen on going pro, I could definitely see you working in the food industry,” says Suna thoughtfully. “You _were_ always good at making onigiri.”

“See? Not so ridiculous. I do like cooking for myself at home.”

“Where are you living now?”

“Hirakata, not far from my team’s stadium,” Osamu replies. Suna stares at him with something like dismay.

“Isn’t that a bit over an hour away? You came all this way for drinks with _Kameda?_ ”

Osamu snorts with laughter. “I had something on in Kobe during the daytime, and my teammate suggested I meet up with him. I didn’t have anything better to do, so…”

“Kameda didn’t say anything about trying to set you up, huh?”

“I’m never trusting a word he says ever again.”

Their food arrives and Osamu’s face lights up. The smell of curry is strong and even Suna’s mouth waters a little. They pass each other chopsticks and serviettes and cups of water, and Osamu looks ready to inhale his entire meal in one gulp.

“Easy, Kirby,” says Suna. “Take your time to appreciate the food.”

Osamu claps his hands together and closes his eyes serenely. “I’m the last person who needs a lesson on enjoying and appreciating food.”

They dig in, Osamu making blissful humming noises and Suna laughing, until they eventually fall silent for a few minutes, too engrossed in their meals. Suna wordlessly passes a piece of fried chicken onto Osamu’s dish, and Osamu gives him a large piece of crumbed pork and nudges the gyoza towards him. There’s a funny familiarity to all this, a whisper of years ago when they would do this during high school, and Suna isn’t sure what to make of how natural this still feels. Before he can get too lost in his thoughts, Osamu speaks up.

“Can I admit that I’m curious?”

“About?”

“About whether you’re currently dating anyone or not.”

Suna snorts. “Kameda pulling his stunt today didn’t offer any clues?”

“Well, it’s Kameda. I’m surprised you’ve told him your full name.”

“I’m not _that_ bad.”

“So he _does_ know your full name?”

“I think so. He might’ve forgotten it, but he did know it at one point. Anyway… no, I’m not seeing anyone.”

“Surely you’ve dated _someone_ , though.”

“Mm… I dated a guy from uni in my third year for about half a year? And later, a girl who was a friend of a friend for about… eight months, I think. But I haven’t spoken to the guy since we broke up. It just kind of died down towards the end, and we drifted apart. The girl realised she was in love with someone else, so we broke that off.”

“Ouch.”

“It worked out. We’re still friends, but we don’t speak that often. We’re just… Facebook friends. Okay, that’s me. How about you?”

Osamu smiles dryly. “I’ve been on a few dates here and there, but it’s never been anything serious. Nothing that lasted more than two dates.”

“Really? No one?”

“No one.”

“ _No one?_ ”

“Is it really that surprising?”

Suna shrugs helplessly. “You know how popular you were back in high school! I just figured you would’ve found someone by now.”

“That’s got nothing to do with being popular, though.”

“More dating options? More people throwing themselves at you?”

“ _Rin_.”

“Never mind. You’re hopeless; I get it, now.”

Osamu throws a crumpled serviette at him.

The evening carries on, and Suna is pleasantly surprised to find there’s no awkwardness here, no uncomfortable silences, no want to abruptly end their dinner, no wishing that he could make excuses to leave. Osamu tells him about the more memorable trips he and his team had taken to away games, the short slump he had last year that he picked himself up from because the thought of losing to Atsumu was worse, what his parents have been up to, his plan to work in the food industry after he retires from volleyball. Suna talks about moving out of home and living in Kobe, a bit about his work and his colleagues, the three-week trip to Europe he took with some uni friends two years ago, a bunch of recommendations for restaurants with good beef around the area. Their empty dishes and cutlery lie at their elbows for what feels like hours, and it’s only when the staff politely ask them to pay their bill because it’s closing time, that they finally stand to leave.

“Ugh, I’m so stuffed,” says Suna with a comfortable stretch when they step out of the restaurant, into the warm and humid night air. “What did you think? Good right?”

“Mm, it was,” says Osamu contentedly.

“But… you still want to eat something else?”

“Mm, I do.”

Suna gives a bark of laughter. “How about ice cream? There’s a Baskin-Robbins just a few minutes from here. We can walk off the curry.”

“Do you have work tomorrow?”

“Oh…” Suna thinks for a moment. He does work Saturdays, but… he’s comfortable right now. But he also has an early appointment. But he’s having fun. But he needs to think about how he’s going to kick Kameda’s ass tomorrow. But it doesn’t even feel that late right now. But it actually is. But…

“Rin,” says Osamu with a laugh and a nudge, stirring Suna from his thoughts. “Go home and rest, okay? You said it was Baskin-Robbins, right? I’ll go find it. Do you live far from here?”

“Nah, I’m just a few stations down,” says Suna. There’s a feeling of disappointment in the pit of his stomach that he can’t shake off.

“Okay.” There’s a pause. Osamu is smiling and looking like he has a lot he wants to say, and Suna understands. They had spent hours at the curry restaurant, and yet, it feels like barely any time has passed. “Dinner was fun. Let’s catch up the next time I’m in Kobe.”

An invitation, almost. A hint of _please don’t say no_. Because dinner _had_ been fun. Off the top of his head, Suna can already think of a number of other restaurants to eat at which he hadn’t listed to Osamu already.

“Of course,” he says. “Let me know when you’re back over here.”

“Sure. Have a good night.”

“You too,” says Suna. And then, after a pause, “It was really good to see you again.”

Osamu’s smile widens. “It was good to see you, too.”

“Good night, Osamu.”

“G’night, Rin.”

And with that, with a warmth in his chest that spreads to his arms and legs and fingers and toes, Suna turns and begins to make his way to the station.

* * *

( _Rin_. Over and over again throughout the night, the nickname still fell from Osamu’s mouth in the same ways it did back in high school.)

* * *

The next day, Suna is at his desk in his consultation room and peacefully eating lunch: a ham salad he’d bought from the nearby convenience store because he thinks he’s still feeling the heaviness of the curry from last night, plus a tuna-and-mayonnaise onigiri because hanging out with Osamu made him want to eat an onigiri. He hears footsteps head his way, and then—

“Sooooo…” Kameda’s voice pipes up and Suna turns to stare, deadpan, at his smug smiling face. “How’d it go last night? I saw you and Miya leave the bar together. Really early, too.” Kameda’s grin turns into something more confused. “Like, five minutes after I introduced you guys. What was that about? Did you get along _that_ well?”

Suna points his fork at him in an almost thoughtful manner, like he was discussing an article he had read. “Did you know that Miya Osamu has played volleyball since he was in grade school?”

“Er, I knew he played in high school…”

“Did you know that his twin—you know he has a twin, right?”

Kameda leans against Suna’s desk. “Of course! Miya Atsumu. He’s also a pro player.”

“Did you know that once, during their second year of high school, Miya Atsumu trashed-talked Miya Osamu when he was having an off day during volleyball training, and so Miya Osamu sprinted across the gym and _literally_ kicked his ass?”

Kameda looks lost. “Uhhhhh…”

“Did you know that I _went_ to that same high school with them?” says Suna, staring at Kameda pointedly. “Did you know that Osamu and I actually dated? _Did you know that you just tried to set me up with my ex?_ ”

Kameda turns three shades paler, before pulling himself together and saying, “Wait, you dated _Miya Osamu?_ ”

“Yes.”

“ _The_ Miya Osamu?”

“Yes…?”

“You _dated_ him?”

“If you sound any more surprised, I’m gonna jam this fork up—”

“You dated one of the Miya twins,” says Kameda in something like awe. “I had a feeling you’d get along with Miya—Osamu, I mean—but I didn’t expect this!”

Suna squints at him. “You had a feeling?”

“Yeah! You both have a kind of… low-key snarky streak about you? But you’re both generally pretty mellow, too. I can’t explain it, man; it’s just the _feeling_ you guys have.”

“The feeling.”

“Yeah! And I was totally right!”

“I don’t know how to feel about that, Kameda. And anyway, Osamu is my _ex_. We had dinner, that’s it. Don’t get all smug about it. And, by the way, my paperwo—”

Kameda hastily makes for the door. “Whoa-I-forgot-I-have-an-appointment-byeeeee!”

“ _You’re not getting out of this one!_ ” Suna calls after him. “You’re just delaying the inevitable! Plus, you still owe me two more drinks!”

Kameda leaves him alone for the entire day. It’s the most peaceful work day Suna can remember having.

* * *

He doesn’t expect to catch up with Osamu again quite so soon, but Friday sees Osamu sending him a LINE message, asking if Suna wanted to have dinner again on Saturday in Kobe. Suna says yes. Because he has no plans, and there’s no reason to say no. Or something. He knows that if he starts thinking about it too deeply, he’s going to be stuck in his thoughts for the whole day, so he had replied with a reasonably quick agreement and a suggestion for a sushi train place he liked.

“Over the off-season, I’m doing a bit of work for the team,” Osamu explains when they are seated towards the middle of the restaurant, and plate after plate of sushi pieces trundle past them at a leisurely pace. “It’s just occasionally meeting potential sponsors as a representative, and also doing a bit of scouting for upcoming talents. Some of my teammates do similar work in Osaka and in Kyoto, but the team sends me and two others to Kobe once or twice a week. It’s just for a bit of extra income.” He plucks a plate of salmon belly nigiri and a plate of ark shell nigiri off the conveyor belt. 

Suna takes a plate of whitefish nigiri for himself and says, “Was that why you were here last week?”

“Yeah, I was watching a university game.”

“How do you get around? It’s not exactly cheap, taking the train from Hirakata to Kobe, right?”

“They let me borrow a car half the time; otherwise, the team takes care of my public transport fees.”

“Oh…” Suna reaches half-heartedly for a plate of octopus sashimi nigiri before Osamu’s words hit him and he freezes, watching the plate trundle away. “Wait, you can _drive?_ ”

Osamu squints at him. “I passed my driver’s licence test with pretty good scores, for your information.”

“Show me your licence.”

“Why?”

“I have to see it!”

“ _Why?_ ”

“To prove you aren’t lying, and also to see your photo. Give it!”

Rolling his eyes, Osamu claims a plate of prawn nigiri with mayonnaise before fishing his wallet from his bag and pulling out his licence. Suna snatches it from him eagerly, stares for three seconds, and then slaps it down on the counter with a disappointed groan.

“Why is your photo so _normal?_ Couldn’t you have looked like you were about to sneeze or something?”

Osamu snorts and slides it back into his wallet. “Excuse you. Apart from my volleyball skills, this face”—he gestures to his face—“is the secondary money-maker. Fashion labels are after me, I’ll have you know.”

“Pass me that salmon one.”

“You _dated_ this face, Rin!” Osamu hands the plate to him.

“Congratulations on getting your licence.”

“Thanks, jackass. I’ll make sure the next photo when I renew it looks extra good, just to spite you.”

Suna dissolves into a bout of snickering as Osamu takes a plate of seared scallop nigiri and eats it with relish.

The fun thing about eating with Osamu is witnessing the small mountain of dishes that build up from all the food he’ll end up consuming. And sure enough, in between their conversations, Suna watches him pile empty plate after empty plate on top of each other. All the plates are for the cheaper tiers, with nothing costing over two hundred and fifty yen. Still a big appetite—always a big appetite—but with enough sense about him, Suna supposes. He knows volleyball players aren’t exactly superstars swimming in endless cash—knows that it requires sacrifices here and there to chase a dream.

And here comes the overthinking. An argument in Inarizaki High’s corridors, the quiet goodbye by the riverside, Osamu holding on for as long as he could until Suna pushed him away firmly enough. Osamu, who didn’t want to let go. Osamu, who chased a dream bigger than Suna would ever be.

And there goes the overthinking, hurtling towards the cliff and right over the edge. Why was Suna thinking about this? Why was guilt starting to eat at him from the pit of his stomach again? It had been years since they broke up. Osamu understood why they did. The last time they saw each other had been amicable. _They had moved on._

And yet, here they were, catching up twice in just over a week.

As friends, of course!

Of course.

It’s just…

No, there’s no ‘ _it’s just_ ’. Plain and simple, they’re catching up as friends because they hadn’t seen each other in so long, and dinner was fun last weekend! That’s all. That’s all.

Before it trundles out of reach, Suna snatches up a plate holding two medium fatty tuna nigiri, shoves the pieces onto one of Osamu’s plates with his chopsticks, and then adds the empty plate to his own pile.

“Not a word,” he says, holding up a finger when Osamu opens his mouth to protest. “You’ve been eyeing every plate of tuna whenever they come by. Don’t think I haven’t noticed. And in any case, this is just one plate, and it’s not even the highest grade stuff, so it’s not like I’m breaking bank here.”

A grin spreads across Osamu’s face. “You don’t have to get so defensive,” he says, and Suna squints at him. “This is so _sweet_ , Rin. Thanks!”

“Why does that sound so sarcastic, coming from you?”

“I’m not being sarcastic!”

“Eat your tuna.”

Osamu is still grinning as he picks up a piece with his chopsticks and says, “Thanks for the food!”

“It’s two pieces, don’t get carried away.”

“Someday, you’ll learn to say ‘you’re welcome’ like everyone else.” And Osamu bites carefully into one piece, bliss crossing his face as he chews it slowly and savours it like a treasure.

‘Everyone else’ probably wouldn’t be overthinking so hard in the middle of a sushi train restaurant about a relationship that ended years ago. Or, would they? How did people think about past relationships? Did people just… hang out with their exes? Well, it depends on the people and the relationship, he supposes. Suna didn’t think about his past relationships nearly as hard as he is right now. He wonders what this said about them, about him, and about Osamu.

Back then, at the end of autumn, neither of them had wanted to break up. But it was something that needed to happen. So, it happened. Suna supposes one reason they could hang out so easily like this was because their break-up hadn’t been messy or angry, but rather one that they had both accepted. It wasn’t really closure, per se, but it was something they were both able to move on from… Maybe? They had moved on, right? Neither of them were in relationships right now, and their past attempts hadn’t been very deep, but that was okay, right? Moving on didn’t necessarily mean moving on with other people, right? It was—

Osamu claps his hands next to his ear very sharply, and Suna jolts in his seat.

“ _Holy sh—_ ”

“Stop spacing out on me!” says Osamu. “I was asking you if you’re done. I’m finished.”

Suna stares at the two piles of plates on Osamu’s side of the counter, and then at his own single pile.

“Yeeaahh, I’m definitely done,” he says, and flags down a member of the waitstaff.

When they leave the restaurant a few minutes later after their plates are counted and paid for, Osamu launches into a stream of gushing over how tasty and fresh the seafood was, and Suna can’t help but feel pleased, given it was his recommendation in the first place.

It’s another humid night. Kobe is bright, warm in a way that has nothing to do with the temperature. As they meander around aimlessly, Osamu yawns and stretches his arms comfortably over his head. The look on his face is the expression he always has after a satisfying meal, and Suna knows it well. Some things really don’t change.

“Where to?” Osamu asks, turning to look at him. Behind him is a neon kaleidoscope of the city’s lights, and for a second—just one second—the way it surrounds Osamu makes him look something less human and something more divine, and Suna thinks of offerings to gods and shrines, to stars that shone too brightly to ever dream small.

There’s a brief clenching feeling in his chest. He doesn’t know why he thinks this, but he supposes Osamu has always occupied these thoughts in his mind, and that hasn’t changed either, even after all these years. Maybe that would never change. He wonders what this all means.

“I didn’t really plan,” says Suna. “Anywhere you wanted to go?”

“Not really,” says Osamu. “Wanna keep walking around?”

Suna shrugs. “Sure.”

And they do.

They used to do this often when they had free time over the weekends back in high school—both before and during dating each other, they would walk anywhere and everywhere without a particular destination in mind, sometimes running errands, sometimes getting snacks along the way, sometimes talking about anything, sometimes falling into comfortable silences. Somehow, tonight is not so different, just with the added element of Suna overthinking again. Maybe Suna was thinking about this in a purely friend-basis? Was he? God, this is tiring.

“Hey, Rin?”

“Hm?”

“Can I ask you something?”

Suna looks confused. “You can just ask,” he says. “You’ve never… _asked to ask_.”

Osamu shrugs sheepishly. “I guess this is different.”

“Spit it out already,” says Suna, even though there’s a funny twisting sensation in his stomach. He doesn’t know why, he doesn’t know what Osamu’s going to ask, but he has a very odd feeling that—

“I was wondering,” says Osamu, and he takes a deep breath, “what you thought about… trying again. Being in a relationship again. Us. You and me.”

Suna stops walking abruptly.

Oh.

Oh, _that’s_ why.

“I mean, I figured there was no point in dancing around it,” Osamu continues. Suna is staring at him with wide eyes. “If you don’t want to, I get it, you know. I _really_ do. But, if you want to try…”

This was fast. This was happening so quickly. It had only been a week since they caught up, after not seeing each other in years.

“Maybe this is a little fast,” says Osamu, because even after all this time, he can still read Suna like a book, or maybe Suna is just easy to read—who even knew at this point? “But when I saw you last weekend and we had dinner, it kind of felt like not a lot had changed? I thought, maybe, since neither of us are dating anyone, we could give it a try and see if it leads anywhere.” And here, Osamu shoves his hands into his pockets and lowers his eyes, scuffing the sole of his shoe against the ground. He adds in a quieter voice. “When we broke up, it wasn’t because we didn’t like each other anymore. So…”

There’s a part of Suna’s brain that’s yelling ‘ _AAAAAAAAAAAAA_ ’ and, as the seconds tick past, another increasingly loud part that’s yelling at that bit to shut up. This is Osamu, after all. He is not a stranger. Osamu is not a god nor a star out of reach nor someone who needed the world given to him. He is Osamu. He is—

“Hey,” says Osamu softly, looking at him now. “Rin?” 

And Suna thinks of summer. He does not know why he thinks of summer. It’s summer right now, in all its humidity and neon lights and typical Kobe life, but the summer Suna thinks of is water fights and orange juice bottles and training camps and leaning against each other, comfortable enough to doze off. This is the sort of summer he’ll always think of when he thinks of being with Osamu.

“I’ll,” says Suna, as a croak more than anything, “think about it. Okay? I’ll think about it.”

Osamu winces at him. “You’re not freaking out, are you? You look like you’re freaking out.”

“I’m not freaking out,” says Suna, quietly freaking out.

“Do you, uh, want to go home first?”

“I didn’t say anything about going home,” says Suna. “I want bubble tea. Let’s get bubble tea.”

“Are you sure you—”

“Yes, I’m sure. Let’s get bubble tea.” And Suna turns his heel and begins walking in the direction of the closest store. Osamu hurries after him.

“Rin,” he says, and he looks exasperated, a little guilty. “I’m sorry, I didn’t—I shouldn’t have—”

“No, it’s not that,” says Suna. “It’s just—you took me by surprise, that’s all. I just—I’m not—”

Here they are, stumbling over their words like flustered junior high kids. They had never been shy around each other. Not like this. Never like this.

Suna stops walking. He takes a deep breath, breathes some of that tension out of his shoulders, and turns to Osamu and says, honestly, “I want to give you an answer right away, Osamu. I really do. But I can’t. I’m sorry. Just… give me some time, okay? I’ll give you an answer eventually, but not tonight.”

(Like mediocre offerings to gods and shrines and—

No, no, no. Not like that. Never like that.)

Osamu smiles. He doesn’t look so guilty anymore—more exasperated than anything. “You always did think too much, Rin. Even when you pretended you didn’t. Okay. Let’s get bubble tea, then.”

Suna nods wordlessly and continues leading the way. There is a long queue at the store he’d been planning on—his favourite and preferred bubble tea place—which makes him scrunch his face up, and it makes Osamu snicker. He grabs Suna’s sleeve and pulls him into line and they stand to wait. As if he hadn’t just dropped a bomb on Suna, Osamu chats about shenanigans he and Atsumu have been up to since they graduated high school, all the times they’ve teamed up to bother Aran again, all the times they had squared off in matches, how Atsumu’s JTEKT Stings had recently approached Osamu and the Panasonic Panthers and asked if they wanted to do semi-regular YouTube videos where both twins would answer questions from fans as an informal cross-promotional campaign for the upcoming V.League season. Suna laughs out loud at that.

“That’ll definitely get you viewers, but I’m not sure if for the right reasons.”

“No, really?” says Osamu, deadpan. “We’re professionals. Angels. The most well-behaved. We never get into trouble.”

“I can’t… I don’t… ugh, I can’t even think of a comeback for that.”

They’ve moved back into the more familiar and more comfortable atmospheres of conversation and banter. The tension Suna had been feeling has eased a bit, lessening amongst their chatter and their laughter.

Osamu did this on purpose, he realises at one point. He had seen Suna freak out, and now he’s actively making him laugh and taking his mind off what he had said on purpose. 

Was this his way of showing Suna he cared? Did it mean he needed to treat Suna like a delicate thing, now?

It’s true that Suna had never been all that great at handling big changes. This was something Osamu knew well—something he had been on the receiving end of. Realising Suna liked Osamu during high school was one such change. Realising they would have to part after graduation was another. Both times had ended up with Osamu being hurt in some way.

And yet, he still tried to hold on. He had tried to hold onto Suna for as long as he could. And he wanted to try again.

What could the Suna of today give him? Not the Suna of high school days who barely knew what he wanted to do after they graduated, not the Suna who ran away instead of facing the person he liked, not the Suna who was just a boy and had to rely on his family and juggle school responsibilities, but the Suna of _right now_ , who had gained independence and grown up a little, and had a good job and lived in a new big city and could do anything if he could just gather the courage for it.

Ah, so much for ‘taking his mind off what he had said’.

He doesn’t realise the cashier is calling their numbers because their drinks were ready until Osamu looks at his own receipt, peeks at Suna’s, and then snatches it out of his hand and marches to the counter.

“If you keep spacing out, I’ll drink all of yours,” says Osamu, handing a sheepish Suna his bubble tea. “Don’t think I can’t.” 

“I’m not stupid enough to doubt you,” says Suna as he stabs his straw through the lid and they begin strolling leisurely down the street again.

“Are you… still freaking out?” Osamu asks.

Suna takes a long sip of his drink before answering, truthfully, “Not really? I’m just… thinking. I said I wanted to give you an answer eventually, but…”

“It doesn’t have to be today,” says Osamu. “I’m not in a rush. I’ve got time.”

“How are you so easy about this?” says Suna. “I’ve never been good at giving you a direct answer unless you literally corner me, and even then…”

And here, Osamu smiles wistfully into the straw of his drink. “The more someone pushes you, the more you run away—”

Suna winces. “Ow. But… true.”

“And I don’t want you to run from this. So, this is me, not pushing. I mean, I guess I’m still pushing, but…” Osamu gives a helpless sort of shrug.

“You’re not pushing,” says Suna. “It feels like you’re doing the complete opposite.”

“Somehow, you make that sound like a bad thing.”

(Did it mean he needed to treat Suna like a delicate thing, now?)

“I don’t know.” Suna gives a little laugh, as helpless as Osamu’s shrug, and there’s something oddly comforting about this—that for all Suna thinks they’ve grown up and maybe changed over the years, there’s still this sort of humbling helplessness they both feel. That they can still be clumsy with their feelings and stumble like this, and maybe that was okay. That not every moment was going to be as dramatic as that day they barrelled down the streets near their school because Suna was running away from Osamu like he was trying to leave his feelings behind.

(The break-up hadn’t been Osamu’s idea. He hadn’t wanted to let go at the time. He didn’t—)

“You still like me,” says Suna quietly. “Don’t you?”

“Mm… I think so?” says Osamu.

“You think so.”

“I think so. I’m not sure. Maybe I’m just comfortable with you, maybe I like you romantically again—I don’t really know. So, I guess this is my way of trying to see. Sorry if that sounds half-assed, but… I think if you were anyone else, I wouldn’t be comfortable enough to want to try to find out. Is that weird?”

“No,” says Suna honestly.

Did Suna want to give it a try? Did he not? Why did that seem so simple, when it really wasn’t?

He jumps and gives a yelp of surprise when Osamu jabs him in the ribs.

“Don’t overthink it!” says Osamu, sternly now. “Don’t give me an answer today. Or tomorrow, for that matter. Or for like… the whole week. Okay?”

“Okay, okay,” Suna gasps, rubbing his side gingerly. “ _Jeez_ , you’re a pro player, now! I’ve seen your serves and your spikes, you can’t just _jab_ someone like you used to!”

“Oh… sorry. Um. Are you… okay?”

Suna glares at him. Osamu is trying to stifle his laugh. “You, Miya Osamu, are _unbelievable_.”

“I’m sorry,” Osamu wheezes. “Really, I feel bad! I’m—”

“Oh my god, stop,” says Suna, and Osamu turns away to cover his mouth with his hand. “Drink your damn bubble tea or I’ll be the one drinking it for you!”

In the stuffy summer night of Kobe, Osamu’s laughter is clear. For a brief moment, Suna wonders if this counts as an answer.

* * *

The following Thursday, Suna and Osamu have lunch together. Osamu meets him outside his clinic, carrying a backpack. 

“What did you feel like eating?” Suna asks, but Osamu shakes his head. 

“I made us lunch. Let’s go! There’s a nice park not far from here.”

“What do you mean, you made us lunch?” Osamu just turns and starts walking. Suna hastily follows after him. “Hey, what did you make? Osamu! You’re a little too smug for someone who’s made lunch. What did you have planned?”

“It’s just lunch, Rin.”

“Then tell me what it is!”

“Suna-sensei?”

Suna stops walking abruptly, and Osamu turns around, too, after a few steps. A woman a little older than them waves to Suna with a bright smile.

“Oh! Err, Imai-san, wasn’t it?” says Suna. “You had a shoulder injury. How are you?”

“I’m well,” says Imai, nodding. “My shoulder hasn’t been giving me any problems lately—and it’s all thanks to you! I’ve been itching to get back into table tennis, so…”

They chat for a few minutes, Imai happily giving him a general update on her training schedule, and Suna giving her tips and reminders on how to look after her shoulder in the meantime. He expects Osamu to scroll through his phone as he waits, but instead, he watches them with a soft sort of smile on his face.

“—so I’ve been using my left arm instead, but I think I—Oh!” Imai starts, looking hastily at Osamu. “I’m so sorry! I got so caught up, I didn’t… Are you on your lunch break?”

“It’s okay,” says Osamu. “Go ahead.”

“No, no, I’ve already taken too much time.” Imai turns to Suna. “I’m sorry, Suna-sensei, I’ll let you be, now. If my shoulder gets worse again, I’ll let you know.”

“No problem,” says Suna, smiling. “Don’t forget the ice packs, okay?”

“Got it! Thank you very much. Enjoy your lunch!” Imai gives quick bows to the both of them and then one last bright smile, before turning and hurrying away. Suna falls into step beside Osamu again and they resume their walk to the park.

“Sorry about th—”

“Don’t _apologise_ ,” says Osamu with a friendly sort of impatience. “I got to see you in your element! Sort of. I have literally never seen you so nice to someone before.”

Suna gives him a deadpan sort of look. “I’m not sure that’s the compliment you think it is…”

“Not a compliment,” says Osamu. “Just an observation. Back in high school, you weren’t exactly kissing our bruises better and patching us up—”

“ _What._ ”

“—but now, you’re helping people. We both know how injuries can affect athletes, and you’re helping them to recover. That sort of work is so important, Rin.”

“I know that,” Suna murmurs. “I just don’t get what you’re trying to say.”

“I’m saying that you’ve changed a little,” Osamu replies with a small smile. “I told you, after we had dinner, it felt like not a lot had changed, but the parts that did? I think you’re more patient, now. You only thought about sports physiotherapy in our last year of high school, and I guess there was that part of me that wondered if you would stick with it. So… it’s just really nice to see you suit your work.”

“You saw me talk to _one_ of my patients for just a few minutes.”

“Do you treat the others wildly different to that lady just then?”

Suna shrugs awkwardly. “Depends on the patient? But for most of them, I guess not. Anyway, where did all this come from?”

Osamu jostles him lightly and says, “Just thinking out loud.”

They reach the park and sit down on one of the benches in the shade of a large tree. Osamu takes out two bento boxes from his backpack. One is for Suna.

“Hold on a second,” says Suna as Osamu opens one of the boxes with a flourish, revealing a carefully prepared colourful assortment. “ _Hold on a second_.”

“What?” says Osamu, grinning. “I had free time this morning, so I decided to jazz up our lunches.”

“You are trying to _woo_ me.”

“Yes, exactly! Having lunch together is super adorable. Look!”

Being the bigger eater of the two, Osamu’s bento box is slightly larger than Suna’s, but they both have the same foods: rolled eggs, deep fried prawns, grilled eel, leafy greens mixed with a scatter of corn kernels and purple cabbage, slices of carrots cut into stars, and a serving of fluffy white rice. There is a panda face cut out from dried seaweed sitting in the middle of Suna’s rice.

“Osamu, what the hell,” says Suna faintly, snapping photos on his phone.

“Not to brag, but I’ve really perfected the rolled eggs over the years. Oh! I cut some rockmelon, too!” Osamu yanks a small plastic tub from his bag and holds it up proudly. Suna stares at him.

“I usually just buy lunch,” he says weakly. “Thanks…”

“You’re welcome!”

Everything is delicious—not that Suna expected anything less. Osamu watching him keenly as he eats is distracting, though, and he only stops when Suna reaches up to shove his face away.

“Quit that!”

“Oh, sorry. I wanted to gauge your reaction. How are they?”

“ _Really_ good. And you’re right, the rolled eggs are perfect.”

“Right? Next time, I’ll make onigiri!”

Next time. Next time. Next…

“No panda faces,” says Suna after thinking for a little while. “Or any faces. They’re so innocent, and I feel guilty eating them.”

“Okay, no faces. Any requests for onigiri flavours?”

“Surprise me.”

“Hmm…”

“Just… Just don’t get too carried away, okay?”

“Me? I never get carried away.”

Suna points to his bento and looks at him pointedly. Osamu shakes his head defensively.

“That’s not getting carried away!”

“ _Like hell it isn’t, Osamu!_ ”

Lunch is fun. They bicker and banter as they eat, and it’s comfortable company. Suna doesn’t think too hard about what Osamu had asked over the weekend.

But it lingers. It definitely lingers.

He’s thought about it over the past couple of days—after all, how could he not? But no solid answers come to mind. There’s half of him that wouldn’t mind trying to be in a relationship with Osamu again, and half of him that says the opposite. That opposite half is made up of fractions that bounce between ‘ _hurry up and move on already_ ’ and ‘ _you’re being so wishy-washy about this, doesn’t that mean you don’t actually want to?_ ’ and ‘ _your past non-Osamu relationships never went anywhere, what makes you think this will work?_ ’ and, quieter but harsher, ‘ _you’ve hurt him too many times_ ’. Some days, one half is louder than the other. Suna doesn’t know which way to lean.

And yet, Osamu is here. Osamu is still here.

“Thanks for the food,” says Suna, setting his chopsticks down after his last bite of rice. In a blink, Osamu seizes the container of rockmelon, and Suna snorts with laughter.

“Give me a second to digest this, first.”

“I was going to bring green tea, too,” says Osamu with a pout as he pries the container open and sets it down on the bench between them. “I had a thermos and everything ready. But I left it at home.”

(Next time. Next time. Next…)

“Next time, then,” says Suna, more quietly than he’d intended. Osamu’s eyes flick up at him, and he smiles. 

And then, because Suna is a man of sentiment who is in denial about it, he stands up without a word and heads to the nearest vending machine. There, he feeds some coins from his pocket into the machine, takes out two bottles of orange juice, and returns to where they’d been sitting. He sets the bottles down on the bench. Osamu’s face breaks into a grin.

“It’s still not an answer,” says Suna hastily. “I just figured that we could both use a drink. It’s a hot day today.”

“Okay,” says Osamu. He’s still smiling. Suna thinks of everything he would’ve done for that smile, all those summers ago. “Thanks, Rin.”

* * *

Not that either of them had set a deadline for Suna to give Osamu an answer, but another week comes and goes and he still says nothing. 

Osamu drags Suna out for lunch again (udon) on Sunday because he’s scouting at another university game in the late afternoon. Suna, as it turns out, is slightly hungover from drinks with his co-workers the night before—a fact that Osamu takes with great glee at Suna’s expense.

“I drank Kameda under the table,” Suna mumbles in protest as Osamu pours him another cup of iced water, snickering the whole time. “Stop laughing so loudly.”

“I’m not,” says Osamu. “I’m actually really quiet.”

Suna jams his palms against his eyes. “ _Uugghh_ , why are summers so _bright?_ ”

“Keep hydrated, dumbass. And eat your udon.”

“Why is water so _cold?_ ”

Osamu snorts. “Do you want tea?”

“No… just udon soup…” Suna mumbles pathetically and scoops a spoonful of the broth into his mouth. Osamu dissolves into a fresh wave of laughter.

“I was going to ask if you wanted to come along to the match tonight, but uh…”

“When is it?”

“It starts around four.”

“Mm… can do. I should be good by then. I can walk the hangover off in the meantime.”

“What did you have in mind?”

“Shopping? It’s one of our receptionists’ birthday coming up soon, and she’s always been really good to everyone, so I want to get a nice lil’… something. I don’t know what. Yeah… do you have something on?”

“No, no,” says Osamu. “Let me accompany you while you stagger around and mumble like an old man. Can I livetweet you?”

Suna squints at him, though he’s not sure if it’s because of what he said or because it’s still really bright out. “Aren’t you meant to be the nicer twin? I can’t believe you’d betray me like this.”

“Is that a no?”

“You _cannot_ livetweet my hangover, jackass!”

It’s a date, almost. Or maybe not even ‘almost’, maybe it just _is?_ After their udon lunch, Osamu tries to pay for their meals, citing Suna’s hangover and his slow reaction to finding his wallet and the fact that Suna had bought Osamu a plate for their sushi train dinner, and only relents when Suna threatens to go home.

“You’re trying to woo me again,” Suna says accusingly as they step out of the restaurant and shoulder their bags.

Osamu grins. “Is it working?”

“Does it _look like_ it’s working, Osamu?”

“It _looks like_ you seem less hungover. I guess the food did you good.”

“Mm… it really was tasty udon.”

And then, Osamu offers Suna his arm, all gentleman-like. Suna stares at it, and then at him. Osamu’s grin widens.

“You know, just in case you’re gonna stagger into telephone poles or something.”

“I’m _hungover_ , not _drunk_ ,” Suna protests.

Osamu just gives his elbow a wiggle.

Suna groans and loops just his wrist through it, holding onto him loosely. “It’s too hot.”

“Okay, Rin.” They set off down the street, towards the main shopping area.

“I can walk just fine. I got here with no problems.”

“Sure, Rin.”

“I’m having serious doubts about you being the nicer twin.”

“If you say so, Rin.”

And this sort of thing continues on and on—the lunches and the dinners and the outings, not the hangovers, though they do make an appearance two more times, and Osamu laughs and pokes fun at Suna both times. The bits of flirting too; initially, Suna had refused to call it flirting, up until the point where he really couldn’t deny it anymore.

It’s comfortable. It’s new, being able to hang out more freely like this now that they are both adults and not tethered by everything they had to consider when they were high school students, but it’s comfortable.

(What could the Suna of today give Osamu? Not the Osamu of high school days who knew he wanted to go pro and chased dreams that took him to bigger cities, not the Osamu who kept his anger in check until it burst like firecrackers, not the Osamu who had the courage to let Suna go—but the Osamu of _right now_ , who took hold of his dream and kept reeling it in and believed in second chances, and was reaching out to Suna once more.)

Days go by. Suna still doesn’t give him an answer.

* * *

The end of summer is creeping slowly closer, but the stubborn, stifling humidity won’t leave. Tuesday evening, it’s bucketing rain, and Suna had missed it by mere minutes as he arrived home in his apartment. The summer sky is still bright for this time of the evening, but overcast, like it can’t make up its mind. He hates this sort of weather.

Suna takes a shower, washing off the weather sticking to him. When he’s done, he scrolls through his phone for the day’s social media updates, when it rings and Osamu’s name flashes on the screen. Since they started hanging out again, he had never called, and their plans to meet up were always made through LINE messages. With a frown, Suna answers it.

“Osamu?” There’s a long pause. He can hear the rain on the other side, pattering like static. 

“Yeah, hi… Sorry, I’m just… Can I come over? I’m in Kobe for work today. There are problems with my train line and the station’s packed.”

“Of course,” says Suna. “Where are you right now?”

“Sannomiya station.”

“You were going back to Hirakata, right? Okay, I’m the opposite direction, not far from Sannomiya. I’ll send you my address.”

“Thanks, Rin.” Osamu sounds tired.

When he arrives at Suna’s doorstep several minutes later, Suna is wrong: Osamu isn’t tired, he’s _exhausted_. He looks—there is no kind word for it—awful; rather like—there’s no kind metaphor for it—a sad puppy left out in the rain. His wet hair is clinging to his face, the upper half of the jacket of his casual suit is soaked through, and the legs of his pants are soaked up to his knees from the rainwater. His messenger bag is half wet, clutched in his arms in a valiant but ultimately futile attempt at keeping it dry.

“I’m sorry,” says Osamu, like he’s trying to force the words to leave his throat. “I know it’s late, but I—”

“Come in. Go take a hot shower; you look like you could really use one.” Suna ushers him inside, passes him a towel, a long-sleeved shirt, and track pants, and then shoos him into the bathroom. When Osamu re-emerges a few minutes later wearing Suna’s clothes and looking slightly more refreshed, Suna grabs his jacket, shirt, and pants, and throws them over the clothes horse he’d set up in the corner of the living room, and then fishes a smaller towel out from a closet. Only half-aware of what he’s doing, he throws it over Osamu’s hair and begins towelling it dry. He’s not completely sure why—it’s not as though Osamu can’t do it himself, but he just looked so _tired_ … 

“I couldn’t find your hairdryer,” says Osamu.

“Oh, yeah, I forgot I don’t have one at the moment. It stopped working about two months ago, and I just didn’t bother replacing it.”

“How do your clothes fit me? I’m, like, twice your size.“

“Don’t exaggerate. But I did get you my baggiest clothes.”

“Ah…”

“You know, I’m surprised at you. You’re usually the one who carries an umbrella around.”

“I forgot,” says Osamu.

“First time for everything, I guess.” Suna stops for a moment, and then adds, “So, volleyball training was pretty bad today, huh?”

“Is it that obvious?”

“It is to me.” He resumes towelling Osamu’s hair. “In high school, you always had this look on your face whenever you had an off day at training. You’ve got that same look now. It’s different to your other unhappy faces.”

“Huh…”

“I’ve known you for a while; I picked up hints.”

Osamu smiles, shutting his eyes as Suna begins towelling his fringe dry. After a while, he sighs. “I asked one of the neighbourhood association teams in Osaka if I could practise with them this morning, but I was complete shit the entire time.”

“There we go.”

“It was really embarrassing. I’m trying not to let my off days ruin my mood but…”

“That’s just how you are sometimes, though.” Suna stops again and steps back from him, tilting his head to the side with an exasperated little smile as he takes in how ridiculous Osamu looks with his hair all mussed up and sticking out everywhere. “What was it Gin said? You’re your own harshest critic. And he’s right. I think that’s something that’ll never change about you.”

“When did he say that?”

“In second year. It was right before you ran past him and fly-kicked Atsumu for trash-talking you when you had an off day back then.”

“Of _course_ you remember that.”

Suna continues drying his hair. “I still have photos somewhere. It was a pretty epic fight.”

“‘Tsumu had bruises for days.”

“He definitely got the worst of it. Anyway, you can’t keep beating yourself up for something like that.”

Osamu sighs again. “I know. It’s just… the worst thing about off days is that it drags on. It doesn’t end, for the _whole day._ ”

“I know.” The way Suna says that is unexpectedly gentle. He hadn’t meant it to be. But the tiny smile Osamu gives him stops him from trying to take it back or play it off. “And you know it too. You know it’s part of the parcel of being an athlete.”

“Hhmrgh.”

Suna finally stops towelling his hair and drops the towel into his bathroom to deal with later. “Have you had dinner?”

“No, not yet.”

“I was thinking of getting food delivered, but then I felt bad for anyone out in this shithouse weather. I’ll make us something.”

And now, a mischievous smile crosses Osamu’s face. “You can cook?”

Suna sticks his tongue out at him before he turns and heads into the kitchen. “It comes with living alone. I can burn everything to perfection. I hope you like charcoal.”

“My favourite.”

“Good.” Suna pulls his fridge door open. “I’ll make really horrible fried rice… I’ll add too much water and take it out of the rice cooker too quickly so it’s all mushy on the outside but chalky on the inside”—Osamu groans as though in pain—“and I’ll add too much water to make bland miso soup… completely ruin some eggs… ooh! I have salmon. I’ll burn that too. Sound okay?”

“You don’t have to.”

Suna pulls the wrapped salmon and some eggs out of the fridge and nudges the door closed with his foot. “I’m taking that as a yes.”

“It’s too much effort. We can—I can grab dinner nearby when the rain has stopped.”

“Nope. You doubted my cooking, so now you have to suffer.”

“ _Rin_.”

Suna scoops rice grains into a large bowl and brings it to the sink to wash as he says, “I’m not letting a houseguest go hungry, even if he is as rude as you are. Go watch some TV or something.”

“At least let me help.”

“ _No_ , if you help, the food will be _good_. I’m meant to _burn_ everything.”

Osamu makes a beeline for the kitchen. Suna is unsuccessful in his attempts at kicking him out.

A while later, they’re seated at Suna’s small dining table with fried rice, steaming bowls of miso soup, a plate with several pieces of perfect rolled eggs, and grilled salmon. Suna makes noises of mock-disgust as he snaps photos for his social media accounts and bemoans how good everything looks. Osamu is snickering. 

And then, he takes his own phone, taps at it, and then music begins to play from it: the first song is _A Day By Atmosphere Supreme_ by Nujabes. Suna looks up at him in surprise.

“Jeez, that’s nostalgic,” he says. 

Osamu nods. “I usually play music if I’m eating dinner at home. This is okay, right?”

“Why wouldn’t it be?”

“No reason.”

And they clap their hands together in thanks before tucking into their food.

Osamu looks better, Suna thinks. He looks happier, not so weighed down by the embarrassment of his off day. It’s probably the food—food has always cheered him up.

They chat about anything that comes to mind. _Luv Letter_ by DJ Okawari comes on in Osamu’s playlist, and Suna tries not to think of mellow afternoons at the Miya household years ago. Osamu rants about a company’s CEO his team had been hoping to have sponsor them, who was a grouchy old man (“He could take the sunshine out of Okinawa.”) and was stubbornly set on old ways; about trying to track down a pair of new volleyball shoes he had ordered that was meant to come in through the Osaka branch of a sports store chain that ended up in Kyoto, and then to Wakayama for some reason, before finally being sent to Osaka; about his off day, how he had apologised profusely to the neighbourhood association team, and they had cheerfully waved it off and invited him to train with them again, though it’d probably take a while for the embarrassment to finally leave him. Suna admittedly doesn’t have much exciting non-work things to share, so aside from work talk, he spends much of the time snickering at Osamu’s woes and poking at his wallowing. 

“And here, I thought you were going to be sympathetic,” says Osamu, glaring at him over the bowl of his miso soup, though Suna knows he doesn’t mean it. “You were so nice to me when you were towelling my hair. Did I hallucinate that?”

Suna grins. “I mean, I _can_ be sympathetic, but…”

“Nah, I feel like you’ve already exceeded your quota for today.”

“Good, you’re keeping up with the program.” Suna, done with dinner, sets his chopsticks down and pushes the plate holding the remaining two rolled egg pieces towards Osamu. “You’ve always been the type to think about your next step. Sometimes, you let things happen because it’s not in your power to change it, so you think about the next thing you can do instead.”

Osamu raises his eyebrows, not quite convinced. “Really?”

Letting his off days happen because sometimes he has bad days, and that’s it, it was as simple as that. Accepting that Atsumu was the more sought-after player on the Inarizaki team, and using that to spur himself into working harder. Letting Suna go—

“Yeah,” is all Suna says. “Really.”

“What’s my next step from here, then?”

Suna shrugs. “Go easy on yourself for the rest of today. You’ll bounce back tomorrow. You always do. Off days and slumps don’t last forever.”

Osamu doesn’t reply, but he has a little smile on his face, just like when Suna had been drying his hair, just like the time they’d bumped into Suna’s patient. What was it that Osamu had said at that time? He had mentioned Suna changing, being more patient… nicer. _Just thinking out loud._

“Anyway…” Suna points to the last of their dinner. “Hurry up and finish the eggs. And the last bit of salmon.”

Smile widening, Osamu does.

Suna washes the dishes afterwards, and Osamu listens and laughs as he complains about Kameda being annoying at work. Afterwards, Suna sets his phone on the coffee table and joins him on the couch, flopping down unceremoniously with a gap between them. They talk and rant and bicker and laugh. Outside, the rain comes and goes, stopping for only a few minutes at a time before bucketing down again.

It’s almost eleven o’clock when Osamu’s phone finally runs out of battery, and the mellow music stops. He makes no move to pick it up and charge it. They fall into a comfortable silence.

“Thanks for today. I feel a lot better,” says Osamu. He glances out the window. “It’s been a long day. Once it stops raining, I’ll head off. The trains should be okay now.”

He looks better.

But Suna also knows him well enough to know that it’s not so simple—that he knows Osamu doesn’t want to leave. That he wants to stay, because Suna is here. Because he’s still waiting on an answer, and Suna still isn’t ready to give one to him.

And… Suna doesn’t want to be alone right now, he realises. He knows it’s the same for Osamu. This easy company they probably hadn’t felt in a long time—wasn’t it okay to hold onto this comfortable familiarity for a little longer? Wasn’t that okay?

“You can stay the night, if you like,” says Suna, even though a small part of his brain is screeching for him to shut up. “It’s late and it really doesn’t look like the rain’s gonna stop anytime soon. I have an extra futon.”

Osamu looks over at him and opens his mouth to speak, before looking like he’s thinking better of it. He closes his mouth and looks back out at the rainy view again.

“You have work tomorrow,” he says.

“It’s fine,” says Suna. “The clinic’s not far, and my first appointment isn’t until half-past nine. I wouldn’t feel good about sending you off like this, anyway.”

“I’m not a kid, Rin.”

Suna holds up a finger. “Let me rephrase that: if you catch a cold, and therefore aren’t functioning at a hundred percent for volleyball, Atsumu would hunt me down and kick my ass for letting you go out into the rain. I don’t feel good about that. It’s making me nervous.”

At this, Osamu smiles. “Since when have you been scared of ‘Tsumu?”

“Have you seen his serves lately? He could give me a concussion and I wouldn’t even have time to blink.”

“That’s true.”

There’s a long stretch of silence, and then Suna says quietly, “Osamu.”

The stubbornness seems to leave him at the sound of his name. Osamu’s gaze drops to the floor and he sighs and moves his head in the smallest of nods. He looks tired.

“I can just take the couch. You don’t need to—”

Suna stands up and moves to switch the light off, and the room is darkened somewhat comfortingly, only lit up by the outside lights streaming through the windows. When Suna sits back down on the couch, he closes the gap between them, pulls Osamu close, and presses his head to his own shoulder. Osamu doesn’t resist, and Suna can feel him relax against him almost right away, like he’s breathing what’s left of his tension out of him.

Easy, familiar, warm, reminiscent of more comfortable days. A small part of Suna tells him to take back his offer and send Osamu home, and to push this night out of his head, to move on, find other people to date, forget about everything over the past handful of weeks. But a much larger and probably less wiser part of him tells him that this—this one night, this one moment of letting their guards down, this falling back into happier habits—this is okay. They’ve put up a front for so long, they could let it down for just a little while. They’re both tired. They can try this odd game again tomorrow.

They fall asleep like this on the couch. _Luv Letter_ plays in Suna’s mind over and over again. Outside, the rain continues to pour, and neither of them has any idea when it stops.

* * *

This is not an answer, Suna tells himself.

* * *

Almost two weeks later, Suna is in Kobe Harborland, heading back towards the station after a dinner out with some co-workers at the shopping mall, when he looks up absently at some of the large posters nearby, and he suddenly freezes in his tracks, eyes wide.

Osamu, gracing one of the large posters, stares seriously back at him. He is wearing a baggy pair of black sweatpants, a dark grey shirt, and a white sports jacket with red and gold accents, his hands in its pockets. _MIYA OSAMU FOR H &M_ is written in English in thin white letters across the poster, with the H&M logo sitting under it.

Suna snaps a photo, and hurries away.

* * *

“It’s not _that_ funny, you shithead,” Osamu is saying over the phone a short while later. “Athletes do fashion endorsements all the time, it’s not— _Rin_ , can you _shut_ the _fu_ —”

Suna is breathless with laughter, wiping tears from his eyes.

“You are such a _dick_ ,” says Osamu loudly, though there’s no malice in his voice, and this only serves to make Suna laugh even harder. “Do you know how much of an ass you sound like, right now? I’ll tell people, ‘my ex called me up just to make fun of me’, and then _everyone_ will know that y—”

“You,” Suna wheezes, “modelling for _H &M_.”

“It’s to advertise a new line of sportswear,” says Osamu impatiently. “They got a bunch of local athletes to wear that stuff and pose, I’m not the only one. They got some guys from the J.League, and some basketball, baseball, and tennis players.”

“Did Atsumu say anything?”

He can almost hear Osamu roll his eyes. “H&M approached him, too. He’s got his own posters around. I only did it because my club thought it’d be good publicity, and because I needed the money. Okay? _Stop laughing_. This is why I didn’t want to say anything, you asshole. Okay, _fuck you,_ I’m hanging up.”

“Wait, do I get a signed copy or—”

Osamu hangs up. Shortly after, he sends Suna a text message consisting of several middle-finger emojis. People walking by give Suna strange looks as he starts laughing all over again in the middle of the footpath.

And then, because he’s not in a rush to get home, and because he’s curious, Suna sets off around the city, looking for the other H&M posters. He spots one of Atsumu’s on the other side of Harborland, but is disappointed to find that there’s nothing to poke fun at it. In his photo, Atsumu is wearing a sleeveless black hooded top with dark red accents and light grey track pants, also staring seriously at the camera. It’s a good photo, and Atsumu looks very good in it. So, that’s boring. Suna seeks out others. He spots some posters of other athletes that Osamu had mentioned, but, apart from some of the volleyball players and one or two of the more famous J.League and baseball league players, he doesn’t recognise anyone else.

But he does spot another of Osamu’s posters on the side of another building, along with two other athletes. Here, Osamu is wearing a baggy white t-shirt and fitted black pants. It’s a more candid shot: he has one hand combed through his hair and is looking away from the camera with a small but warm smile on his face.

This one. This is more like Osamu—this casual elegance that’s so familiar to Suna. It’s a good photo. 

In truth, he doesn’t blame H&M at all for recruiting Osamu to model for them. Even more so than their high school days, Osamu really is stunning, growing into even more defined features and gaining a killer jawline in the process and those sharp _cheekbones_ , and—

“Can’t believe I dated you,” Suna mutters under his breath. “What the hell.”

Dated. Past tense.

(That quiet afternoon by the riverside, when they—when _Suna_ —broke things off. He had been Osamu’s, and Osamu had been—

—his, for a little while.)

But…

People walk past Suna, careful not to jostle him as he stands before that poster of Osamu, unmoving. Perhaps he’s getting strange looks. Perhaps people are laughing at him. Perhaps they’re wondering what he is thinking about.

He is thinking about this:

Summers at training camps, water fights, orange juice bottles, mellow music during half-hearted study sessions, sprinting through the neighbourhood’s streets and Osamu holding onto his shirtfront like it’d take all the force of the sky splitting for him to let go. He thinks of Osamu letting go. He thinks of the weight of Osamu’s head on his shoulder when they fall asleep beside each other. He thinks of Osamu arriving on his doorstep, drenched by the pouring rain and looking exhausted and Suna wanting to brush all that away. He thinks of meeting each other again at that cruddy bar by coincidence, like the universe has other plans for them and he thinks of strolling leisurely through Kobe’s streets together and eating at a curry restaurant or an udon restaurant or whatever Suna has recommended for their meal or maybe Osamu has made him lunch again with lovingly prepared bento boxes and they’re chatting for hours and hours on end and Osamu’s laughter is clear in the afternoon or evening sky and—

Deep breath.

He is thinking that the weeks since he and Osamu first met up again have been fun. He is thinking that he has been comfortable. He is happy. They’re both back in each other’s lives again, and he wouldn’t swap this for the world. How easy it was to fall back into familiar habits. How easy it was to fall back into familiar habits with Osamu. How easy it was to fall—

For all Osamu had said about _maybe_ and _giving this a try_ and _seeing if it leads anywhere_ , there were times when he was just as easy to read as Suna could be. For all Osamu tried to put Suna at ease and was gentle when he reached out to him, he was easy to read: after all these years, Osamu still loved—

He still loved—

Osamu still loved Suna. 

( _He still loved Suna._ )

Maybe they had grown up and lived different lives now, but _that_ —that familiarity, that comfortable company, that love—that had not changed.

The Kobe cityscape reminds Suna of that warm and humid night after their sushi train dinner, wandering around aimlessly, and then seeing Osamu lit up by the neon kaleidoscope of the city’s lights and looking like something less human and more divine. That evening, Osamu had asked Suna if they could try again. That evening, weeks ago now, and Osamu was still waiting on an answer.

Osamu had always been the one reaching out to him, and he wasn’t afraid of being hurt again. Maybe, maybe, maybe, Suna could be less afraid of hurting him. 

Maybe, maybe, maybe, it was about time Suna met him halfway.

(Because they’re older and a tiny, tiny bit wiser now, and Suna knows, more than ever before, what he can and can’t give Osamu. Because he was no longer the Suna of high school days—he is the Suna of _today_ and of _right now_ , and he could give him a place to stay the night when Osamu didn’t want to be alone, he could offer places to have a good meal where they could chat for hours, he could listen to Osamu’s woes or Osamu could sit through Suna’s hangovers and they could poke fun at each other in ways long-time friends and lovers could, he could make time to be with Osamu whenever he wanted, he could give him his patience and his small acts of kindness and love. He could give them both his patience. He could give Osamu orange juice bottles and quiet afternoons together and a shoulder to rest on. Because there’s a part of Osamu that would always, always be that beautiful boy Suna had loved years ago, with that laugh and that clever smile, trying his hardest to reach out to Suna in the little ways that he knew best.

Because Osamu has always deserved Suna reaching back out to him, more than he’ll ever deserve Suna’s cowardice and pushing him away.)

What does he do when love says ‘ _stay_ ’? 

What does he do when he wants to stay?

( _Deep breath._ )

* * *

**WEDNESDAY (afternoon):**

  
**From: Rin**  
oh yeah i showed my parents ur H&M posters

  
 **From: Miya Osamu**  
[middle finger emoji] [middle finger emoji] [middle finger emoji] [middle finger emoji] [middle finger emoji]

  
 **From: Rin**  
my parents adore u, remember?  
my mother kept gushing  
blahblah osamu-kun is so handsome blahblah  
my father kept going ‘so rintarou where’s ur H&M posters’ and laughing to himself

  
 **From: Miya Osamu**  
finally, Suna family members with good sense  
what went wrong with you??

  
 **From: Rin**  
excuse me  
i d a t e d you  
i have the best sense

  
 **From: Miya Osamu**  
[shocked blushing emoji]

  
 **From: Rin**  
[winking emoji]

  
 **From: Miya Osamu**  
[middle finger emoji] 

* * *

**THURSDAY (morning):**

  
**From: Rin**  
so  
when were u gonna tell me u and Atsumu started doing the joint team promo vids

  
 **From: Miya Osamu**  
i don’t have ur number saved  
pls don’t ever contact me again

  
 **From: Rin**  
i watched it while i was making dinner   
nearly burnt my veggies cos i was laughing so hard

  
 **From: Miya Osamu**  
error ur msg couldn’t be delivered, pls don’t try again

  
 **From: Rin**  
watching u bickering more than u answered fan questions  
i was like  
wtf  
but then i noticed both ur teams twitter accounts gained more than a thousand followers each by the end of the day  
and i thought  
ah  
these marketing ppl really know what they’re doing

  
 **From: Miya Osamu**  
i hope ur rice is crappy next time u cook dinner

* * *

**THURSDAY (night)**

  
**From: Miya Osamu**  
u wouldn’t happen to be the one who commented on the vid with  
♡♡♡♡♡OSAMUUUUU♡♡♡♡♡  
would u  
uh  
youtube user s_n__RNTR_0125  
???

  
 **From: Rin**  
hahahahahaha

  
 **From: Miya Osamu**  
Tsumu saw and he’s demanding answers

  
 **From: Rin**  
he’s just jealous  
i’ll add more hearts next time  
[winking emoji]

  
 **From: Miya Osamu**  
[shocked blushing emoji] [shocked blushing emoji] [shocked blushing emoji]

  
 **From: Rin**  
[winking emoji] [winking emoji] [winking emoji]

* * *

**FRIDAY (morning)**

  
**From: Rin**  
got the biggest craving for grilled ox tongue  
wanna grab some grilled skewers for dinner tomorrow if ur free?

  
 **From: Osamu**  
yesssssss where??  
[drooling emoji]

  
 **From: Rin**  
there’s meant to be a really good place in Amagasaki  
let’s meet at the JR station, south exit at 7  
not the edion side, the other one

  
 **From: Osamu**  
Amagasaki?  
not exactly next door to u… are u sure? 

  
**From: Rin**  
getting from Hirakata to Amagasaki takes a lot longer than Kobe to Amagasaki  
you’re the one always meeting me in Kobe   
and you’re the one always inviting me out to meals  
i know this isn’t really balanced but i figured I should at least meet you halfway for once  
or try to

  
 **From: Osamu**  
i don’t mind tho

  
 **From: Rin**  
i know  
but i think it’s taken me long enough

**FRIDAY (afternoon):**

  
**From: Osamu**  
i’ll see you there

* * *

The next day, they’re both at the south exit of JR Amagasaki station at seven, with Osamu arriving a few minutes after Suna. Suna is sitting at the edge of the circular public space planter near the station’s exit, and he has a small smile on his face when he looks up and sees Osamu approaching. Osamu sits beside him, a small gap between them.

They sit in silence for a while, watching people walk to and fro, coming in and out of the station. On an ordinary evening, Suna would be just like them, making his way from work to home and planning dinner in between. Tonight is not an ordinary evening.

“You wanna hear something stupid?” Suna asks. He doesn’t have to look at Osamu to know that there’s a growing smirk on his face.

“You mean, aside from every second thing you say?”

Suna rolls his eyes and says, deadpan, “Fuck you.” Osamu laughs.

“Tell me something stupid,” he says.

They are quiet again for a moment as Suna tries to put his thoughts together. The small gap between them feels like a vast distance.

“When I was still thinking about quitting volleyball,” says Suna slowly, “part of me thought that maybe if I stuck around and kept practising and up my skills… then I’d keep bumping into you at matches or something. I’m still not completely sure why that was one reason for me to keep going, it wasn’t like I was thinking about dating you again at that time, but I just…” He trails off, frowns as his thoughts jam and refuse to move properly. 

“Rin?” Osamu murmurs. Suna exhales.

“It just felt like… if I fell behind, then you’d be out of reach, and that’d be the end of it,” he says. “I could see you on TV and watch your matches, because I knew you’d make it as a pro, but I wouldn’t ever be close to you again. It scared me a little. I had a similar problem back in high school, too, before I told you that I liked you. You were always just so… _bright_. You were so far away.”

“And yet, we’re both here,” says Osamu. 

“I did tell you, it was something stupid.”

“It’s literally the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard you say.”

A smile quirks at Suna’s mouth. “Brutal.”

“You still quit though,” says Osamu. “It wasn’t all because of your coach, was it?”

“He was a big part of the reason. I think I could’ve kept playing, regardless, but… I _was_ forcing myself to stick with volleyball. But then, I was watching one of your matches in… I think near the start of the second year of uni—the one against Tokai Uni? I watched it on TV. You were brilliant in it. You were incredible. You just blazed through the entire thing. The commentators couldn’t stop talking about how good you were.”

“Rin—”

“When you made that last spike that won your team the match, and you were celebrating with your teammates? You just looked so _happy_. And I guess that was when I knew that no matter what, no matter if I was still in your life or not, you were going to be fine. And if you would be fine, then so would I. So I made up my mind to quit. At one point, the Toray Arrows had invited me and a few of my teammates to a training session, but I turned that down—”

“Holy shit.”

“Yeah, my coach thought I was crazy, but I stuck with it. I started falling back from playing volleyball. I put more time and effort into my studies, graduated, worked at a few different clinics for a while, finally found a full-time job, moved out…” He pauses. “Bumped into you again. I didn’t think I would, but it happened. And now, we’re here, and…” 

Suddenly, he doesn’t trust himself to speak, doesn’t trust himself to look at Osamu.

He had been so out of reach, untouchable, bright—chasing dreams bigger than Suna would ever be.

And yet, he’s here, right now. He’d caught his dream, and now, he was looking at Suna again. He was not—never was—a god with a shrine nor a star out of reach. He was just… _Osamu_. He had always been, and would always be.

“I loved you,” says Suna. “ _So much_. But I don’t regret breaking up with you. I knew that I’d never forgive myself if I had kept you from following your dreams.”

“The _hell_ , Rin,” says Osamu, frowning. “I can handle volleyball and having a relationship.”

“Not back then,” says Suna. “You were trying to get into Chuo, remember?”

“That’s…”

“You were just as much of a volleyball nerd as Atsumu was.” Suna smiles slightly. “You may not have noticed it, but everyone else did; it was hard to miss. You got lost in volleyball almost as often. But you were kinder than he was. I mean, I know that’s not saying much”—Osamu snorts—“but you weren’t as… _ruthless_. I guess that’s why I thought you needed that extra push.”

“You dumbass,” says Osamu. “You don’t get to be the one to decide that.”

“I know. I didn’t realise that until much later. But I think… even if I had realised, I probably still would’ve broken up with you.”

“And now?” Osamu asks. “If we had to go through something similar again?”

“It’s different, now. We’re not high schoolers anymore. We have less limitations, more freedom. I can give you so much more.” And then, Suna drops his gaze to his hands in his lap and says, quieter: “I can give myself more.”

(Everything he wanted to give to Osamu—they were for himself, too. They were things he wanted to share between the both of them over and over and over again. He knows this for certain, now.)

“You know,” Osamu says slowly, and Suna gives him all his attention. “Once I got accepted into Chuo, I… wanted to ask you if we could get back together again. But we just got so swept up in end-of-high school stuff, and university stuff, and I had to organise my living arrangements in Tokyo, and then there was the fact that we’d be in a long-distance relationship if we tried again, and I didn’t know if we could make that work. I mean, we were still friends on social media and all that but… I just never knew how to ask you. I kind of hoped that once you saw I had made it, you’d ask _me_ out again. But…” Osamu pauses, heavy. “You didn’t.” His tone is not accusatory, but it’s not free from disappointment, either.

(He would always, always, always deserve Suna’s honesty, more than he’ll ever deserve Suna’s cowardice.)

“I wanted to,” says Suna with a slight nod. “Trust me, I did. But… it felt wrong of me, given I was the one who broke it off first. I felt like I didn’t really deserve it.”

Osamu makes a loud drawn-out noise that’s part-sigh and part-groan. “I can’t believe the guy I’m head over heels for can be such a dumbass.”

Suna gives a bark of helpless laughter. “I guess I deserved _that_.”

“You _really_ did.”

“And yet, you still want to date me.”

“I _really_ do,” says Osamu. He tilts his head back at the darkening sky, the summer’s sunset not willing to yield just yet. He gives a little laugh, and it has a helpless sort of tone, too. “I like you so much, Rin.”

(What does he do when love says ‘ _stay_ ’? 

What does he do when he wants to stay?)

Suna turns in his sitting position on the edge of the planter, folding one leg and tucking it underneath himself, facing Osamu now. He sighs. The more dramatic part of him considers this a surrender to whatever plans the universe has for him. The better part of him knows that it’s so much simpler than that.

Osamu mirrors him and shuffles closer until their knees touch. They’re facing each other, now. A small smile crosses Suna’s face, and Osamu leans in, slowly, uncertainly, slowly, uncertainly—

With barely any space between them, Suna says, in a whisper more than anything, “I’m sorry I took so long.”

“Okay,” Osamu whispers. He smiles, too. “Okay.”

And he kisses him.

There’s silence, stillness, like suddenly, it’s just the two of them, and everything else pauses for a while to let this happen. It feels like forgiveness, like time itself has forgiven Suna for all the days and weeks and months and years he’s made Osamu wait. How achingly familiar this feels, like the world hadn’t moved in the time between their first kiss and now. Suna could let himself fall and fall and fall for Osamu over and over and over again, and it’d make his heart race each time. 

They aren’t strangers. Suna is Suna, and Osamu is Osamu. Loving him was the easiest thing in the world.

* * *

_“—deadly line-shot by Miya against a three-man block, the Panasonic Panthers now lead the Suntory Sunbirds eighteen points to thirteen, and—Suntory have called a time-out!”_

_“They’ll need more than a time-out to stop Miya, who has been on fire since the start of the season, despite an incredibly close loss against the JTEKT Stings two weeks ago, where, of course, his twin brother plays.”_

_“Miya Atsumu and Miya Osamu, both of whom have been called up to the national team recently for the upcoming match against Canada—”_

Suna closes the sports app on his phone and looks up as he hears footsteps near, and a young man with his arm in a brace pokes his head into the room.

“Suna-sensei.”

“Yoshino-san! Hello. Come in, take a seat.”

Yoshino drops into the chair by Suna’s desk with a sigh. “That was a V-League match, wasn’t it? My sister follows it. Are you a fan, too, sensei?”

“You could say that,” says Suna with a smile.

“Did you ever play?”

“I did, back in high school and during my first year of uni. My high school team was really strong.” 

“Ooh… do you know any pro players?”

And Suna’s smile widens a little, and he says, “I know a few.”

**Author's Note:**

> [twitter](https://twitter.com/naffnuffnice/)
> 
> **NOTE:** if you've enjoyed this and/or the [_Heart Reign_](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1514411) series, thank you. Having said that, please, don't comment with something like "finally!" or something about how long it's taken. I took my time with this because it's dear to me, but also because I write at my own pace. Thank you for understanding. ♡
> 
>  **♡ PLAYLIST:** https://open.spotify.com/playlist/1skTBhVaoDcyrCWXLtxX73?si=4vTjwfWMQpWggRAQp1PBTg


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